


Like a Knee in the Chest

by thatbigsinner



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997)
Genre: Blackmail, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Emotional Manipulation, Extremely Dubious Consent, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Sex Slave Cloud Strife, Stockholm Syndrome
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:02:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 7
Words: 8,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26780344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatbigsinner/pseuds/thatbigsinner
Summary: Cloud Strife comes, through unfortunate circumstance, into Sephiroth’s tender care. Through J-cell usage, emotional manipulation, and blackmail, Sephiroth gets Cloud to not only stay, but do anything he asks—with no limits.
Relationships: Genesis Rhapsodos/Cloud Strife, Sephiroth/Cloud Strife
Comments: 11
Kudos: 144





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this fic is a massive collaboration between myself and one of the writers at hornybraincell!! we plotted it out together and I’ve been slowly working at getting it written with a coherent storyline. parts of it are inspired by whumptober prompts, parts just by conversation.
> 
> tags will be added as they become relevant! please keep a close eye on them as you go! I will put tw in chapter titles for additions as necessary.
> 
> the strifesodos is WAY down the line please be patient y’all
> 
> title stolen from: https://twitter.com/sikenpoems/status/1311701817957453824?s=21

Cloud came to slowly, his head so dizzy he felt nauseous. He had to blink repeatedly, looking around the room. He wasn’t sure where he was, or how he had gotten here. Last he knew, he was in the Northern Crater. He had… he had given the Black Materia to Sephiroth. He had fallen into the Lifestream, and then what?

He tried to sit up, but found himself stuck. He opened his eyes, but it didn’t do much good. There seemed to be a thick metal band around his throat keeping him from lifting his head. He felt similar bands at his wrists, waist, and ankles. They were plenty noticeable, the metal frigid to his bare skin. Someone had taken his clothes at some point. 

He started with his wrists. He tried to jerk them up, only to be stopped. He tried again, slower this time, pressing up with all his force until he felt bruises starting to press into his skin. He relaxed back against the table, anxious and afraid. Wherever he was, he wasn’t going anywhere soon. 

He waited. He waited and waited and waited, but nothing happened. He remained, the darkness yielding to the bright of his eyes until the lights might as well have been on. The silence felt so loud, his ears rang with it. His panicked, racing breath seemed so loud in the silence. He tried to control it, to slow it down and quiet it, but he failed. He knew he was hyperventilating, but he couldn’t stop it. 

He jumped at the sound of a door opening. The small creak sounded like thunder to his ears. He tried to angle his head, but all he saw was the small panel of light that came in from the doorway. Then the light was flicking on, and he shut his eyes and shrunk away, the light digging into his eyes painfully. It felt so bright, even through his eyelids. 

He stayed like that, frozen in a wince, cracking his eyes open for only brief flickers before shutting them again, until he felt a gloved hand on his face. Then it was worth it to fight through the brightness and look up. 

He didn’t like what he saw. 

Above him, looking down with fondness and endless possessiveness, was Sephiroth. He could feel his long hair brush his naked shoulders as the smile curled on his face. 

“You’re finally awake. That’s good—I have waited quite a while. Putting you back to your original state in the mako poisoning drew it out, it seems. But you’re in one piece now, wholly yourself without the shroud of Zack around your shoulders.”

As he spoke, horror dawned over Cloud. Because that  _ was  _ what he had been doing, wasn’t it? Wearing Zack’s identity like a second skin. Gaia, he hadn’t even realized—and this was not how he wanted to find out. 

“Where am I? Why am I tied down?”

“So that you would not run in your panic when you woke. But there is no need for you to know where you are; you will not be leaving.”

Cloud’s brow furrowed. 

“What does  _ that _ mean?”

“It means, pet,” he purred the word, and Cloud shuddered at it, “that you are mine now. Enough of this foolishness, where we pretend that you’ve ever been otherwise. I’ve been in your head, Cloud Strife, I know what shameful secrets you hide there.”

One hand caressed his cheek. Cloud jerked away from it, but didn’t have much of anywhere to go. The hand simply followed, ignoring his silent protest. 

“I idolized you once, that doesn’t mean I don’t know what kind of person you are now.”

“No, Cloud—you  _ loved _ me once, and you still do. Now you simply hate me as well. That isn’t a problem, of course; I will just take that from you.”

“ _ What _ ? How?”

“The cells that bind us. My mother’s, in both our veins.  _ Mine _ , buried under your skin. It will be a simple matter to use them for this purpose. Enough sustained pressure and you will break as surely as glass beneath my heel.”

Cloud shuddered. His breath picked up again. Because he knew it was true—he remembered the labs, now, he knew it all, exactly what had happened. He remembered the sick, slick feeling of Sephiroth inside his skull. He remembered hearing his voice, and he remembered being guided without it. He remembered his body moving against his will, his hand offering the Black Materia like a sacrifice to a god. 

He knew it was possible. 

He resumed struggling, throwing himself against the restraints with all his strength, despite having no leverage. 

Sephiroth chuckled, cupping his face between his palms. 

“I will unravel your mind like thread from its spool. You will fall apart under my hands, until you become exactly what I want you to be. You will be obedient, and eager, and helplessly in love. There will be nothing you would not do for me. I will take the word ‘no’ from your vocabulary, and you will thank me for it.”

“Sephiroth, don’t do it, my friends will come for me, this won’t stand—“

“Your friends are welcome to try. And, say they succeed? You will be shattered into far too many pieces for them to know what to do with. You will cry and beg to come back to me. You will feel my absence like a missing lung.  _ Pray _ , Cloud, that they do not come for you.”

Cloud felt the panicked, terrified tears drip down his face. Sephiroth bent his head and carefully, delicately licked them away. 

“This will not be the last time you cry, but it will be the last time you are so afraid. I wanted you to know what you would become before I stripped you down to your essence and rebuilt you. I wanted you to have this moment, and I wanted a chance to taste your terror. It’s as sweet as I imagined.”

“Se-phiroth,” Cloud said, the word choppy between his hyperventilating. “ _ Please _ —“

“Don’t worry, Cloud. Next time you beg me, it will not be in fear. You’ll be much happier when I’ve finished.”

“ _ Don’t—“ _

“Sweet dreams, Cloud.”

And then he saw nothing but black. 


	2. Chapter 2

Sephiroth had made many pretty promises. He had said Cloud would never be so afraid again. He was only right to a point—he was never  _ quite _ as afraid again. But he missed the fear. It would be better than the strange way he felt now. He was dizzy constantly, his head always swimming. His skull felt stuffed with cotton. He could never quite get himself to move without Sephiroth’s command. 

“This is only temporary, pet,” Sephiroth had promised. “You’re still fighting me. Once you cooperate, once you give up, this will all go away. I won’t need to press against your mind at all, much less so firmly. You can end this at any time.”

But Cloud was nothing if not stubborn. He didn’t want to be Sephiroth’s  _ pet _ and Sephiroth would have to force his hand if he insisted on this path. He hoped he could hold out long enough that Sephiroth gave up. But the way this was going, the way he felt foggier every day, he wasn’t so sure he would make it like this. 

He blacked out for long periods. He would wake up in different rooms in this strange house they were in, in various positions he didn’t remember entering. He wanted to look out the windows, open the doors, anything to get a bead on his location. But any time he tried to move to do so, Sephiroth made his body go limp. 

There were no such windows in the room he woke up in this time, only the overhead light to see by. He gathered this was a room in the basement—it was where he had woken restrained the first time, the last time he was allowed his fear. He came back to awareness as Sephiroth was closing the door behind him and turning back to Cloud. 

Cloud blinked his heavy, heavy eyelids. He swayed on his feet as Sephiroth came to stand before him. Sephiroth looked at him consideringly as he set a box on the table. 

Without warning, with only a hard mental shove, Cloud’s knees buckled. He dropped to his knees before Sephiroth, who slid his fingers through his hair. He used his grip to tilt his head back and forced blue eyes to meet green. 

“I bought you a gift,” Sephiroth said. “I expect appreciation.”

Cloud wanted to tell him where he could stick his gift. He couldn’t get the words out, but Sephiroth was so deep inside his head that he knew them anyway. He tutted his disappointment. 

He grabbed the box and opened it to reveal some sort of strap that Cloud’s eyes couldn’t focus long enough to see. He fought and fought to see it, but Sephiroth seemed to have endless patience. He was savoring the slow process of breaking Cloud and they both knew it. 

Cloud gasped when he saw what the strap was. It was a cheap dog collar, made of nylon with a metal D-ring at the front and a plastic clip that would fasten it. It was a simple, clean black. It couldn’t have cost more than 10 gil. 

Sephiroth’s lips just barely curled up at the sheer rejection that ran through Cloud. He wanted to pull away, but he still couldn’t control his body. 

“First, why don’t we fix your posture?”

Cloud felt his body start to move, but then his head grew muddy. By the time he fought himself back to the surface, he was sitting back on his heels, back straight as a pin. His hands were pressed neatly to his thighs. He tried, for the thousandth time, to shake his head in attempt to clear it. Nothing happened. 

“That’s better, you almost look like you deserve a gift.”

_ Fuck off _ was on the tip of his tongue, but he couldn’t force it to trip off the edge. Sephiroth submerged his will again, Cloud’s eyes fluttering helplessly shut. 

When he managed to see what was in front of him again, it was the sight of Sephiroth leaning down, his hair spilling around Cloud, cutting him off from the room as surely as a curtain. For a split second, he simply wanted to savor it, to bask in the glow of his green eyes and be enveloped in the little world his hair created. Then the moment passed, and Sephiroth smirked, and Cloud tried to scowl. He still failed. 

Sephiroth reached out to attach the collar. The buttery smoothness of his leather gloves was a drastic contrast to the rough nylon of the collar. It scratched and itched at his throat, but when Sephiroth hooked a finger through it to test the tightness, the leather soothed his skin like a balm. His eyelids fluttered again. His head swam. 

When he came back to, Sephiroth was cupping his cheek, and he was leaning into the gesture like a touch-starved cat. He tried to pull away but only succeed in leaning further into the touch, nuzzling at his palm. 

“See? You  _ can  _ act like a good boy. If only your stubborn mindset would shift.” Sephiroth’s thumb slid over his cheek. “But we have all the time in the world. After all, if I’m occupied with you, I won’t need to use the Black Materia yet, will I?”

Cloud felt as if ice water was poured down his back. 

Was he all that was keeping the Planet safe? 

If he could keep Sephiroth entertained, would the world stay safe long enough for his friends to fix his mistakes? 

“Perhaps,” Sephiroth purred, “if you stopped fighting me, I would be more inclined to stay with you. If you became a hopeless project, well, why would I want to linger?”

It was blackmail. It was extortion. It was simply cruel. 

It was also the best hope he had. 

All of a sudden, the mind-numbing pressure inside his skull eased. The dizziness faded, his mind felt clear, he finally felt in control of himself. When he tried to lift his head to look at Sephiroth, his body actually obeyed. 

“Kiss my boots if you understand.”

Cloud swallowed hard, his dry throat visibly working. He dug his nails into the skin above his knees, his jaw tight. 

But, instead of saying a word, he leaned forward. He pressed his palms to the floorboards and dipped his head. He kissed the soft, worn leather of Sephiroth’s boot. 

He started to sit up, but the boot he hadn’t kissed was suddenly on his shoulder, keeping him low. It pressed him lower still, until his forehead was pressed to Sephiroth’s boot. 

When he didn’t struggle, Sephiroth hummed. When the boot was removed and he didn’t move, Cloud could feel his smug satisfaction secondhand, curling through his mind as surely as the smirk he couldn’t see curled on Sephiroth’s face. 

“I suppose it’s a start.”


	3. Chapter 3

Sephiroth was spending more and more time allowing him to be in control of his own body. Now that he was compliant, the pressure on his mind was much lighter. 

It was insidious, like this. He was obedient, now, but it was under duress, so very far from voluntary. But sometimes, he forgot that. Sometimes he sat and stared, admiring Sephiroth, the curve of his cheekbones, the brilliant green of his eyes, the waterfall that was his hair. He’d find himself watching, obsessive, his heart in his throat. He’d snap out of it and scowl, shaking his head to clear it, and when he glanced back to Sephiroth, he’d see green watching him knowingly. 

He told himself that the pressure on his mind must fluctuate. That these moments were when Sephiroth pressed harder, and not simply that the prolonged pressure was cracking him like the glass Sephiroth had compared him to. 

But it was. Very much like glass, cracks were spider-webbing through him. The cracks would meet, and the glass between would fall loose to reveal the love he had thought he’d killed. Every time a new soft spot was revealed, he’d find himself watching with slavish devotion, his heart in his eyes. 

The moments always passed, but as they started coming more and more frequently, he began to fear that one day, they wouldn’t. The knowledge creeped up on him with dread, the taste bitter on the back of his tongue. 

It didn’t help that Sephiroth kept pushing his boundaries. He would ask for more and more from Cloud, and any time he tried to refuse the response was always the same. 

“Ah, well. Maybe the time has finally come to test out the Black Materia.”

And Cloud gave to the threat every time. He sank to his knees. He stopped speaking. He crawled. He ate on the floor from the dog bowl or from Sephiroth’s hand. He called Sephiroth “sir.” He slept at the foot of Sephiroth’s bed. He let Sephiroth take his clothes. 

It was a slow progression. The first time for any of these things was a rude shock. He would try to say no, and then Sephiroth would deliver his calm threat. Cloud would yield, inevitably, and comfort himself, saying surely it would only be once. Every time thereafter, he told himself surely it would be the last. 

It was never the last. 

The rules were getting firmer. Speak when spoken to. Never stand, never walk. Eat how he was told. Keep Sephiroth’s name out of his mouth. 

He always told himself that tomorrow, surely tomorrow, it would be different. 

Until Sephiroth introduced something new. 

Sephiroth led him to the wire-and-plastic dog crate, and Cloud’s stomach sank immediately. He didn’t need to be told to enter his prim posture when they came to a halt. He entered the pose absent-mindedly, his body acting while his mind was busy being horrified. 

“I’ve been spoiling you,” Sephiroth explained. “The foot of the bed will be for when you earn it. The crate will be your normal, from here on out.”

Cloud sat there silently, eyeing the crate. He swallowed hard. He didn’t want this. He would fit in it on his hands and knees, yes, but it would be cramped. He wouldn’t even be able to curl up in the fetal position. He would have to sleep with his face pressed to the hard plastic bottom. His knees would go numb from the pressure. This was going to be bad. 

He must have considered it too long, because Sephiroth said, “Of course, if you’re no longer inclined to indulge me—“

Cloud let out a soft whine of frustration. Sephiroth seemed to allow his sounds, as long as they weren’t words. Cloud crawled into the crate reluctantly. 

He looked up at Sephiroth, who looked smug and satisfied as ever. He locked the crate door behind Cloud, who sunk lower, scowling. 

Until he lapsed into one of his moments. He scooted forward in the crate, weaving his fingers around the bars. He looked up at Sephiroth longingly, who had never seemed more beautiful. His breath caught in his throat. 

Sephiroth chuckled, and it sounded like music. 

“Rest well, pet.”

The name seemed less an insult than a sweet endearment. He sighed softly at the loss as Sephiroth walked away. 

He didn’t think to protest that it was still light out. 


	4. Chapter 4

He didn’t know why he didn’t expect this. 

He stared, slack-jawed, up at Sephiroth. 

He hadn’t even done anything to earn it. He had just hesitated, which, to this point, had been allowed. There had been no warning that this was no longer acceptable. He hadn’t been corrected verbally at all. Sephiroth had simply grabbed his hair and begun dragging him to the couch so fast he skinned his knees, clambering to crawl fast enough. 

He didn’t realize what was about to happen until Sephiroth had sat on the couch and laid his hand on his lap. 

“Over my knee. Now.”

Cloud hesitated. Surely he wasn’t about to be spanked like a misbehaving child. He  _ was _ naked, as he always was these days, and it  _ would _ hurt if Sephiroth tried to make it. 

“The longer you take, the more you will be struck.”

Cloud hurried up onto the couch. He didn’t hesitate to drape himself over his lap, despite the embarrassment of presenting his ass to a man whom he had tried to kill in the past. His breath wavered with anxiety. 

Sephiroth swatted at the apex of the curve of his ass. Cloud’s breath hitched, but it was fine. That had been fine. He could handle that. Sephiroth’s swats slowly creeped lower and lower. When he hit the space where his ass met his thighs, Cloud began cringing. He grimaced outright as the very top of his thighs was hit. He alternated between the tops of his thighs and where the skin met the curve of his ass. The tender skin slowly heated until it felt aflame. 

Only at that point did Sephiroth step up from his careful swats. He hit harder, and harder, every swing winding up a little further, every strike with a little more strength behind it. 

Cloud had a high pain tolerance. He always had, but the mako and the labs had raised it. He tolerated injury better than any other member of AVALANCHE. 

But he had lost track of how many times he was hit. Sephiroth had stopped pulling his blows, and was aiming for the most sensitive part of him. Cloud found himself digging his nails into the sofa cushion, pressing his face to the fabric to hide his tears. 

It felt both like far too soon and an eternity later when his skin gave and blood started to trickle down his thighs. He wondered absently if Sephiroth’s palm was burning. He wondered if maybe his pain tolerance was that high, or if he was wholly desensitized. 

“Stop, please, sir!” Cloud finally whimpered, his face pressed to the cushion, his voice crackling from his tears. 

Sephiroth paused. He ran his hand lovingly over Cloud’s ass, pressing down, pulling the skin taut so the wounds stretched wide. Cloud whimpered. 

“Please,  _ please _ stop, sir.  _ Please _ .”

Sephiroth gave the sorest part of him another sharp hit, and Cloud couldn’t help how he cried out in pain. 

“Have you learned your lesson?”

“ _ Yes.” _

“You’ll do as you’re told, when you are told?”

Cloud didn't comment that he had been doing that already. He understood now—no more hesitation. Comply quickly and eagerly, or face the consequences. 

He didn’t want to know how bad the second lesson would be. 

“Yes, sir.”

“And what do you say for yourself?”

“I’m… sorry, sir.”

“With feeling, pet.”

“I’m sorry, sir.”

“Good. Now off.”

Cloud scrambled off his lap, hissing in pain as his skin stretched and tore. He settled on his knees in his posture, despite how his ass and thighs burned. He could feel the blood smearing onto his ankles. 

“To your crate.”

Cloud tried to hide his grimace by ducking his head. He didn’t hesitate this time—he crawled through the room and down the hall to the bedroom where his crate was. He went inside and dipped his head. 

It was only after Sephiroth had left the room that he dared wipe his eyes and sniffle. 


	5. Chapter 5

Cloud was slipping. 

Cloud was slipping, and it scared him. 

He found himself falling more and more often into that strange state of almost slavish devotion. He hated it every time it happened. He hated the way Sephiroth looked at him so knowingly, with a smug little smirk curling on his lips. He never said a word. Cloud almost wished he would, so he could at least try to deny that it was happening, hopeless endeavor though that may have been. 

Every time he came out of it, he felt sick with shame, his face flushed a bright red. He reminded himself firmly that this was  _ Sephiroth _ , that this man was responsible for countless deaths, his mother’s among them. Nibelheim was his fault. The labs were, arguably, his fault. He had plagued Cloud’s mind with unwanted visions and voices all throughout his time in Midgar. He was simply a ghost that didn’t know how to stay dead. Cloud wished he would haunt someone else. 

And that’s how they were now. Cloud kneeling on the floor at Sephiroth’s feet as the man read something—it wasn’t Cloud’s business to know what it was. He stared absently ahead of him, his expression neutral. He was bored out of his mind. When Sephiroth wasn’t demanding debasing things from him, he was largely left with no interaction, no stimulation, just time to be spent trapped inside his own head. Only, his head wasn’t a trustworthy place to be at the moment. 

He cracked. He slipped. He looked up to Sephiroth with wide, hopeful, loving eyes. Sephiroth finally glanced away from his book to look down at Cloud. He only huffed a laugh before returning to his task. If Cloud leaned against his leg and nuzzled affectionately at his knee, he said nothing about it. 

Cloud wasn’t sure how long he spent like that, pressed to Sephiroth’s leg like some over-large housecat looking for affection. All of a sudden, he realized what he was doing, and that at some point, Sephiroth had started to stroke his hair like he  _ was _ the pet he referred to him as. When Cloud went stiff and hissed in a breath, the slow stroking fingers stopped. Equally slowly, they formed a fist in the locks. He pushed as he slid off the couch, forcing Cloud down, down, down until he was laying back against the floor, Sephiroth draped over him.

“I was wondering how long it would take you to come back, this time,” he purred, holding Cloud’s head steady by the hair. “Would you like to know how long it was?”

“No, sir,” Cloud said, sullen.

“It was over an hour of you absolutely blissful in your place. Why do you fight, Cloud? You could be so much happier if you gave in.”

“That isn’t what I want. Sir.”

“Isn’t it? The day you leave, Cloud, is the day I summon the planet’s doom from the sky. You are trapped. Wouldn’t it be better to be happy, here? At peace?”

“ _ No _ . If I can’t have anything else, I want to at least stay myself,” Cloud said, and then his voice dipped into a whisper. “Let me have that much, sir.”

The hand in Cloud’s hair went soft, fingers sliding down Cloud’s temple and over his cheek lovingly as Sephiroth considered him. 

“Are you truly pleading with me? Is this what you’ve come to?”

“Fighting gets me nowhere.”

“Yes or no, Cloud. Are you begging me?”

Cloud swallowed hard.

“Yes, sir.”

Sephiroth’s breath left him in a gust, his pupils dilating for a quick, breathless second. Then he seemed to grow delighted, his heart rising in his throat. 

Between one breath and the next, his hand turned into a vise around Cloud’s chin, holding him still as his mouth descended on Cloud’s own. Cloud yelped in surprise at the sudden kiss before trying to jerk away, only to find himself unable, the hand holding him firmly in place. Sephiroth’s mouth was soft on his own, demanding but unhurried. He took the opportunity presented by Cloud’s yelp to lick into his mouth.

Cloud panicked. Should he bite? He’d pay dearly for it, if he did. That spanking hadn’t left his mind, and that had only been for hesitating. Should he keep trying to pull away, fruitless though it may be? Should he sit still and allow it? Should he kiss back to appease Sephiroth?

The longer he thought about it, the more of his mouth Sephiroth mapped out. He licked behind his teeth, stroked his own tongue over Cloud’s, pressed delicately to the roof of his mouth. The longer Cloud thought, the harder it  _ was _ to think. He was melting slowly, his brain going fuzzy. It felt urgent that he make a decision, but it was like the gears of his mind had been dunked in mud. He just couldn’t  _ think _ .

He didn’t recognize, at first, the press of their shared cells against his mind. He should have—he’d spent enough time under their sway. His body began to move without his consent, without him even realizing, without having made his decision yet. He began to kiss Sephiroth back, desperate and fervent, moaning and sucking on his tongue. His arms wrapped around Sephiroth, his legs around his hips, clinging and needy for closeness. 

Sephiroth moved to his neck, tugging aside his collar to leave stinging kisses along the sensitive skin. Cloud tossed his head back as he whined and gasped at the feeling. He knew he would be marked up after this, he simply didn’t care. It all felt much too good in the moment. 

His mind was drifting away under the pressure of the J-cells. It simply shut down, all thought process deserting him, leaving him only with animal pleasure. His body simply felt too  _ good _ in the moment, and with his mind too far away to remind him why he didn’t want that, he was only encouraging. 

Time seemed to blur. Everything was heat and pleasure and the occasional sharp sting that only made it all better. 

He lost track of what was happening. It had all felt so hazy and  _ good _ , and then Sephiroth suddenly released his grip on the cells they shared. 

Then Cloud was left to come back to reality as himself again. He found himself on his back, as he remembered, with Sephiroth between his legs. Only, now, Sephiroth had one hand threaded into his hair and his cock buried in Cloud’s ass. 

Cloud’s nails dug into the skin of Sephiroth’s back as he gasped in horror. Sephiroth responded by smirking and snapping his hips forward, and for a second, Cloud’s mind whited out without the help of the J-cells. It was simply the pleasure of Sephiroth striking his prostate that had his eyes rolling back and a wanton moan leaving his lips. 

“You see, Cloud? I know what you want. What you  _ really _ want, beneath all your posturing.”

His hips pulled back so slow, the wet slide of some form of lubricant slicking the movement. Cloud flung his hands away to start clawing at anything nearby in an attempt to get away, but then his hips snapped forward again. Cloud choked on his moan this time, determined to keep it quiet, but he lost the strength in his grasping fingers. 

Then Sephiroth was pulling back again, torturously slow, and ever-so deliberate. It gave Cloud time to grab the couch with one hand and coffee table with the other and attempt to yank himself away. It only made both pieces of furniture screech against the floor as he shoved them instead of moving himself at all, Sephiroth’s weight and grip too strong. 

He thrust forward again and Cloud’s breath was knocked from his chest. He tried digging his nails into the floor to get away this time, but it didn’t work, not even when he dug his heels into the floorboards. He scooted all of two inches, but Sephiroth simply moved with him.

“Stop, stop—Sephiroth,  _ stop! _ ”

Sephiroth hummed low in his throat and picked up his pace but lowered his intensity, his hips rolling slowly but inexorably. He moved his hand from Cloud’s hair to around his throat, pressing neatly to his collar in firm reminder.

“Is that how you refer to me?”

Cloud couldn’t help it. He wasn’t sure if it was the panic, or the hate, or the frustration, but tears began stinging at his eyes. 

His vision was watery as he choked out, “Please, sir, stop!”

“Better,” Sephiroth praised, though his hand tightened a hair around Cloud’s throat. “But why should I? This is what you want, when you stop thinking. When you let yourself dissolve into the love you feel for me.” Sephiroth dipped his head, running his tongue up the wet trail Cloud’s tears had left behind. “And it’s certainly what I want. You do feel exquisite, pet, all hot and wet around me. So  _ tight _ as you tremble with your fear.”

Gaia, and he was trembling, wasn’t he?”

“This isn’t what I want,” Cloud protested quietly, his nails digging useless furrows into the floorboard now, too afraid of the hand around his throat to try and push away again.

“Oh, but it surely is,” Sephiroth purred. “You want my undivided attention. You want my affection. You sought my touch earlier, when you weren’t fighting your heart.”

“That was—that was different—”

“Was it? I’ve been inside your head, Cloud,” Sephiroth crooned. “I know how you feel. I know how every bone and sinew in you aches for me. I’m only giving you what you really want.”

Cloud pulled his hands from the floorboards to press them over his face, smearing his tears as he shook his head.

“It’s not—it’s  _ not _ .”

Sephiroth laughed softly, watching Cloud jerk when he struck his prostate again. 

“Poor little puppet,” he teased, “always so lost and confused. Always trying to be something you’re not. Let  _ go _ . You are  _ much _ more interesting to me when you show your love, after all.”

Cloud went still, save for his trembling. There was a threat there, unspoken but implied. That if he lost Sephiroth’s interest, the Black Materia would be put to use. 

He dug the heels of his hands into his eyes until he saw stars. He couldn’t help the soft sob he gave. 

Sephiroth picked up his pace then, spurred on by Cloud’s tears. His hand tightened just a hair around his throat again. 

“Though you  _ are _ delightful like this,” Sephiroth said softly. “Caught between your hopes and your truth, torn apart as you reach for two incompatible objectives. You cannot have both, pet—but I do so love to watch you try.”

Sephiroth pulled his hand from his throat and leaned back, settling on his heels. He grabbed Cloud by the hips and dragged him up into his lap, fucking into him harshly. 

And Cloud felt nearly sick. It had nothing to do with the way Sephiroth was suddenly pumping into him hard and fast, his hips slapping into Cloud’s ass. It had everything to do with the way Sephiroth was  _ right _ . That at some very base level, he longed for Sephiroth, even to this extent. There was a part of him that wanted to do anything he could to make Sephiroth happy, and it certainly didn’t balk at the idea of offering his body to him. The rest of him, the majority that remember Nibelheim, screamed in frustration and displeasure at this smaller section. It hated the simple idea of doing anything but hurting Sephiroth.

The two parts were completely incompatible. Cloud  _ wanted _ that majority, he clung to it, he  _ needed _ it to remain true to himself and his friends, but that small sliver was undeniable. Try as he might, this was not something he could excise. It was something base in him, something inherent, that had been there since he first saw Sephiroth’s photograph in a magazine as a boy. Since that hero worship had turned into a crush that turned into a poisonous love he couldn’t erase. 

Cloud sobbed harder, then, as he realized that that sliver was stronger than the rest. That it was invulnerable, and permanent, and no matter what he did, he couldn’t be free of it. It would win, in the end. He would fight the good fight, the way he always did, but he understood now that it was a matter of pride, not practicality. It was a losing battle. It was a boulder he was pushing uphill, that was always bound to roll back down.

When Sephiroth pulled his wrists from his face to look at him, Cloud didn’t try to replace them. He let them fall to the side and stared up at Sephiroth through his tears. He watched him shiver in pleasure at the sight.

“I hate you,” Cloud whispered.

“For now,” Sephiroth whispered back.

Sephiroth took him in hand then, and Cloud didn’t want it, didn’t want it at all. He couldn’t stop this, but he could at least pretend he didn’t enjoy it. It was infinitely harder to pretend, when Sephiroth was grazing over his prostate with every stroke, his hand working him over. Sephiroth seemed to know every trick there was to getting Cloud off specifically, having plucked the knowledge directly from Cloud’s head. 

It wasn’t long before Cloud’s trembling became from pleasure, his sobs from pleasure, his nails digging into the floorboards with no intention to escape this time. Cloud did not help, didn’t lock his legs around his hips or try to fuck himself on Sephiroth’s cock, but he couldn’t help the way his hips jerked up from time to time, pressing himself into Sephiroth’s fist. 

“Why don’t you come for me, pet?” 

And, as Cloud had been since he woke in the basement, he was helpless to anything but obey.

The way Cloud tightened around him in his orgasm must have felt excellent, because it wasn’t long before Sephiroth was following him over the edge, filling him until cum leaked out around his cock. 

Sephiroth didn’t pull out immediately. Instead, he fit his hand to the curve of Cloud’s cheek. He leaned down to kiss his mouth as Cloud still panted. 

“Tick tock, Cloud,” Sephiroth muttered against his mouth. “You’re running out of time.”

As Cloud lay against the floor, his hatred so far from him that it was nearly out of reach, he knew Sephiroth was right. That sliver of love was going to win, and he was on borrowed time.

Sephiroth pulled out, his cum dribbling out of Cloud in the process, and tucked himself away. 

“Tick tock.”


	6. Chapter 6

They were reaching some semblance of normalcy, and that terrified Cloud. This shouldn’t be normal. It should never even be  _ close _ to normal. But now, it was shockingly easy to fall in line. He didn’t try to stand anymore. He didn’t try to walk, or speak unless spoken to. He went readily to his dog bowl at meal times, and to his crate to sleep. He didn’t need to think about his prim posture anymore—it was how he settled naturally these days. It felt natural to be naked instead of shameful.

He wasn’t sure how much time had passed, anymore. Quite a lot, he suspected, but he couldn’t know for sure. Was time stretching before him like taffy, or was he judging it properly? He couldn’t tell without a clock and a calendar, but Sephiroth had removed both from the house. 

As he stopped fighting so much, as this all became normal, his hard feelings were slowly disappearing. He was apathetic at best, but, with increasing regularity, he was finding himself enamored. Those weak moments, where he stared at Sephiroth in adoration, were coming more frequently. The sliver of his love was starting to swell and grow, subsuming the whole. 

He told himself it was because of the prolonged pressure on his mind—nevermind that Sephiroth had almost completely stopped that after that spanking. It must have been damage done from when he  _ was _ doing it, he told himself. Nevermind that he was finding it hard to pretend that teenage crush had died in prolonged proximity. Nevermind that he had never managed to be indifferent to Sephiroth, and it had only ever been a matter of time before he slipped like this. He had been on a timer since he entered this house, the sand in his hourglass slowly slipping away, grain by grain. Sephiroth taking him against the floor had done nothing to slow this process. 

Try to deny it as he might, his love for Sephiroth had only ever been lurking beneath the surface. So long in his presence was bound to undo him, but the pressure against his mind had greatly quickened how the laces binding him together came undone. 

He didn’t realize how bad it had gotten until he was left alone. 

Sephiroth had led him to a closet with no explanation, simply a firm command to, “Come along.” It was only once they arrived at the closet that he was told, “Get inside.”

Cloud followed the instruction without hesitation; he had been taught what hesitation would get him. He crawled into the closet and sat back on his heels with his hands in his lap. 

“You are to stay here until I come get you. I will lock the door behind me. I am aware you can break it, but I would  _ strongly _ advise against that—for your own sake. Stay put, pet.”

Cloud blinked up at Sephiroth, but didn’t say a word—it hadn’t been requested of him. He watched, a furrow in his brow, as Sephiroth shut the door. He heard him lock it and walk away. 

And then, distantly, he heard the front door open and close. 

Cloud swallowed hard. 

He hadn’t been alone since arriving in the house—not really. Sephiroth had only ever been a breath away all the time he had been aware. But Sephiroth didn’t dunk him under the river of the cells they shared this time, didn’t try to drown his awareness. He simply knelt in the closet, waiting.

Sephiroth had turned out the lights behind him, leaving not even a sliver of light coming in through the crack at the bottom of the door to see by. He couldn’t tell a difference between when his eyes were open and when they were closed. His ears rang in the silence. The whole house was quiet, no absent creaking of it shifting, no wind rushing past the windows Cloud wasn’t allowed to look out of. 

Cloud wasn’t sure if a minute had passed or an hour. There was no sound. There was no light. He was alone, here, in the dark, in the quiet. 

He had never ached for Sephiroth’s presence the way he did now. He felt the loneliness like a physical stinging. He daydreamed about seeing those green eyes light up the darkness, when everything would feel fine and safe and whole again. His hands trembled in his lap.

Sephiroth had said, forever ago, that the day would come when Cloud would miss him as he would a lung.

Turned out he was right.

Cloud reached out hesitantly in front of him. He placed his hand against the door, just for some sort of sensory input, to feel less like he was floating in the void. He leaned forward, pressing both palms to the wood and his forehead in the space between the two. He whimpered, and it sounded painfully loud in his ears. He clamped his mouth together against the urge to call out. Sephiroth wouldn’t be happy to hear him. He should only speak when spoken to, after all. Those were the rules of the house.

He wondered, then, if this was a test. If Sephiroth hadn’t really left the house and was just sitting outside the door, waiting for Cloud to slip. He decided then that he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t call out, or beg to be released, and he certainly wouldn’t break down the door. He would sit here, quiet and compliant, until he was released.

That was much easier said than done. 

Time was passing like cold honey, dripping by ever-so slowly, stretching thin in the middle. He found himself trembling all over. Was it the cold? Was it the sensory deprivation? Was it the simple loneliness? He didn’t know. He didn’t care to know. All he wanted was Sephiroth back.

The seconds slipped by slower, and slower, until Cloud’s sense of time suspended entirely. He tried to count the seconds, but his pacing fluctuated, he couldn’t keep it steady, he had no idea anymore. Each number he counted might have been a half second or five seconds each—he had no way to tell. 

He found that he was breathing much too fast, now. He was hyperventilating. His nails dug rivets into the skin above his knees as he fought to steady his breathing and failed. 

It only got worse and worse. His breath came faster and faster, shorter and shorter, and he had one last, distant thought that he probably wasn’t getting enough oxygen before he passed out entirely.

He woke, who knew how long later, to the door being opened, letting in a flood of light. He blinked slowly up at Sephiroth, who crouched down in front of him, tilting his head curiously.

“You are built like a SOLDIER,” Sephiroth remarked absently. “There is no physical reason you couldn’t have lasted half a day alone in the dark.”

It was left unsaid that there  _ was _ an emotional reason. 

Cloud didn’t want to think about how dependent he was on Sephiroth now, on his simple presence to feel safe and sturdy.

“Please,” Cloud whispered, propping himself up on one shaky elbow, his head still swimming and not quite thinking straight. “Please don’t leave me again, sir.”

Sephiroth smiled slowly, the expression curling on his lips. He reached down to run a hand through Cloud’s hair. He fisted a hand in the locks. 

“Ask me again. Like you mean it.”

Only, Cloud was coming more aware, now. The effects of having been unconscious were dissolving like cotton candy in water, and his thoughts, just as fluffy and flimsy, were starting to become sturdy again. He swallowed hard. If he was going to beg for this again, it would have to be done while he was aware enough of his words to mean them.

He lowered his eyes deliberately to Sephiroth’s boots.

“Please don’t leave me again, sir.”

“Mm. Did you miss me?”

“Yes sir.”

“How much?”

There was a distinctly correct answer here. Cloud swallowed, his throat working roughly as he did. The answer stung at his tongue as it tripped off, because it was painfully true.

“Like I would a lung.”


	7. Chapter 7

“I have a present for you.”

Cloud’s awareness, these days, was a shaky thing at best. He was spending the majority of his time, now, mindless and content to be Sephiroth’s pet. But he was in a rare moment of lucidity, right now. He was certain that was why this conversation was happening  _ now _ and not half an hour ago, when he was leaning against Sephiroth’s knee and sighing his contentment. 

Cloud turned to look up at Sephiroth, who put his book down. He stood and flicked two fingers forward in a wordless command:  _ heel _ . Some days, the dog commands bothered him more than others. Today, he thought he might have bigger things to worry about. He shifted to his hands and knees and crawled along at Sephiroth’s side as he was led to the roaring fireplace.

And, he realized now, that something he saw earlier was very odd. Because Sephiroth had placed one of the pokers  _ inside _ the fireplace and left it there. He’d thought nothing of it, at the time; he never thought to question Sephiroth, when he was in that content, compliant headspace. But, lucid as he was at the moment, he was  _ certainly _ questioning it now.

Sephiroth came to a halt in front of the fireplace, that strange poker not far from his hand. Cloud came to a rest at his side, looking between him and the poker anxiously. Sephiroth turned to face him, hooking one finger through the loop on the front of Cloud’s collar.

“The collar is all well and good, but it is easy to remove. The bruises and bitemarks are better, but they fade so fast. I thought it might be nice to give you a mark that is a little less… fleeting.”

Cloud swallowed hard. He glanced at the poker.

He didn’t answer. He hadn’t been asked a question. But the look on his face said he was starting to understand, and Sephiroth was starting to look smug. Never a good thing. Certainly not if it meant his suspicions were  _ right _ .

Sephiroth tugged the collar, making Cloud lean forward awkwardly. He was dragged further off balance as Sephiroth reached for the poker and pulled it out of the flame. He held it up for Cloud’s inspection.

His first thought was he wasn’t entirely sure how he’d gotten such a thing made. Did he commission it and pick it up when he was out the other day? Did he make it himself, in the moments when Cloud was less aware?  _ How _ had he gone about making it, if so?

These were unimportant, but safe thoughts. If he was busy thinking of how it was made, he wasn’t busy considering how it would clearly be used.

Held up in front of him, at the end of the poker, was a gleaming, ornate filigree ‘S’ burning a bright orange from the heat. Sephiroth held it dangerously close to Cloud’s face so he could see it clearly, and for one terrifying moment, Cloud thought it would be pressed to his cheek.

“You’ll be lovely, wearing my mark at all times,” Sephiroth purred, and Cloud turned wide, terrified eyes up to him.

He knew he wasn’t supposed to speak, but he still whispered, “Please, sir; don’t.”

Sephiroth tilted his head in mock-consideration. 

“Whyever not? Don’t you  _ want _ proof of who owns you on your skin?” Sephiroth tugged him forward by the collar. “What if you ever got lost? It wouldn’t do for there to be no sign of who to return you to.”

Cloud knew there was no way he would get  _ lost _ . He couldn’t leave the house. The only way he was leaving this house was if his friends came and found him, and the more he thought about that, the more the thought haunted him. He didn’t want them to see what he had become. What if they came when he wasn’t lucid? What if his lucidity slipped while he was with them, and he asked to go back to Sephiroth?

No, he wasn’t sure that was something he wanted anymore. But there was no chance anyone else would find him. No one he would ever see again would return him to Sephiroth, no matter what signs of ownership were pressed into his skin. They would only serve to horrify his friends. They would only be something to haunt him if he were ever free, a reminder he could never be rid of.

He supposed that, much more than any story he was given, was the point.

“I won’t go,” he promised, his voice barely audible. “I’m—” he gave a rough swallow “—yours, sir.”

Sephiroth’s eyes fell to a pleased half-mast. His thumb stroked lovingly over the skin of Cloud’s throat.

“You are, aren’t you?” he muttered back. “Then what better way to show it?”

“There’s no need,” Cloud argued, his heart hammering in his throat.

“Dear Cloud,” he said on a laugh, “when has this ever been about  _ need _ ? Turn around.”

Cloud swallowed hard. He had been out of line speaking in the first place, and apparently Sephiroth was done humoring him. He turned obediently as soon as Sephiroth released his collar.

Sephiroth took him by the back of the neck and pressed his face to the floor. Then, with the same free hand, he lifted his hips. Cloud had to shuffle on his forearms to manage the position, but stayed put, his face to the floor and his ass in the air. 

“Now be still, pet. We wouldn’t want it to come out blurred. If it’s illegible, I’ll just have to do another.”

Cloud swallowed, thinking of all the fine, decorative lines in the metal, and how easy it would be for it to become illegible. 

“Steady, now. On my mark. Three, two, one…”

Cloud grit his teeth, and then the world was overtaken by orange. He could swear he could see it behind his eyelids. Everything narrowed down to a stamp of blinding pain on the skin of his ass, searing and searing and  _ searing _ , and gods, it never seemed to  _ end _ . He wasn’t sure if he jumped or jerked, or if he managed to stay still. The brand stayed firmly pressed to his skin as it burned and caved beneath it. Tears streamed down his cheek as a howl leaked out from behind his clenched teeth. His eyes were clamped shut, but it didn’t help. Everything was orange.

Then the pressure was removed, the brand pulled away from his skin, but the orange  _ stayed _ , it burned, it  _ burned _ and it wasn’t getting any better. Cloud pressed his forehead harder to the floor and whimpered in pain, only to yelp as two hands framed the orange spot of searing pain and pulled the skin taut as Sephiroth inspected it.

“Well done, pet,” Sephiroth praised, but Cloud only heard it distantly. “Clean lines. Now stay like that until it heals. It’d be a shame to have to redo it because you ruined it in the aftermath.”

The hands slid off of his skin, but Cloud was too distracted by the orange. It felt like it was seeping into every crack in his skin and bones. It felt like all he was, now, was orange. All he could think about was orange. He thought he heard the sound of Sephiroth’s boots treading away, but he couldn’t be sure. All he knew was that he wasn’t being pulled after, and that was for the best. He didn’t want to know how the orange would flare if he dared to move. 

It seemed to take an eternity. The orange stayed bright and incandescent for what seemed to be ages, until it slowly cooled to a red. The red lingered, not quite as long as the orange had, but for long enough. Then it settled into cool nothingness. Cloud stayed still, long after the point where he couldn’t feel pain anymore, out of simple fear that the second he moved, the skin would pull and he would hurt again. 

But eventually, he had to dare. He reached up behind him and ran shaking fingertips over the brand. The skin was exactly as it should be beneath his touch—temperature wise. But there were bumps in what should have been smooth skin. Smooth lines and clear curves that had not been there before. Cloud swallowed hard, pressing his forehead to the floor harder.

No one would ever see, he told himself, no one but Sephiroth. He could bear that. No stranger would find them. His friends would never find them, would never come for him. It would just be him, and Sephiroth, until the day came that Sephiroth grew bored. Then Sephiroth would, hopefully, kill him, before setting off to summon their death down from the sky. No one else would ever see. No one else would ever know.

He wasn’t sure when, exactly, he had stopped hoping for rescue. When it was that he had stopped thinking he was biding time for AVALANCHE to find them and kill Sephiroth and end it all. When it was that the end of the world seemed like a foregone conclusion that he was just stalling. He thought maybe it had something to do with the love for Sephiroth budding in his chest that he couldn’t quite stomp out. Maybe he had started rooting for him, somewhere along the line. Maybe it was just the shame, that somehow it now seemed better for everything there was to go up in flame than for someone to witness what he had become.

He supposed it didn’t much matter, in the end.

All that mattered was that no one was going to find them. For better or for worse.


End file.
